They say people don’t remember their early years. Especially before the age of four or thereabouts. But I remember mine. I remember the blood. Can’t really say I remember the pain. But definitely the blood. It was everywhere.
I had cut my hand on a large kitchen knife. How that came about was straight forward enough. I had watched my mum cut all sorts of things with that knife. I was fascinated to say the least. Some of those things I had tried my baby teeth on so I was surprised to see the ease with which she sliced them with the knife.
I had been warned off it a few times until she decided I had better learn the hard way under her watch.
So some day when I thought she wasn’t paying attention, my curiosity got the better of me and I had sneaked into the kitchen and grabbed the shiny knife. I looked at it in amazement then decided to see of I could split some vegetables like I had seen her do with it.
Something went wrong.
All I remember is the blood. It was red. It was everywhere. It was hot.
She rushed in. There was the trip to the hospital. The doctor. The big bandage which stayed on for a couple of weeks before the stitches were removed.
That was the beginning of my fascination with knives.

I guess growing up it was inevitable I would end up in a profession where I could use knives.
I did work as a chef for a while. I enjoyed it but the pay was not worth the hours spent roasting slowly in front of big gas-powered cooking ranges.
I also tried my hands at one of the abattoirs. I found out that though I didn’t mind the blood, I couldn’t stand the repeated task of killing literarily defenseless far animals over and over everyday. Before you jump to wrong conclusions, I love red meat. In fact I am glad I didn’t enjoy it, otherwise it could have been an indication of psychopathic tendencies.

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I can’t tell you exactly how I ended up with a knife in my hand and a long list of dead people who might still otherwise be alive (but no guarantees of course. They could just as well have been run over crossing the street).
But that’s beside the point.
Death comes to all. Some get to pick how, some don’t even realize they are dead and well, some leave when people like me say it’s time.
Of course nothing is for free, I guess I enjoy it so much I could probably do it free half of the time – the other half to pay the bills.
Since the profilers have decided with adequate real life of people misbehaving badly in the throes of passion (think revenge, think greed, think spurned love) that using a knife implies a deep personal connection, it plays nicely into my MO.
Because it’s nothing personal to me. It’s just a job. So while the cops are looking for someone close to the deceased, someone who has an alibi cast in granite which even a truth serum can’t shake loose because the individual can’t reveal what’s he or she doesn’t know because I won’t take a commission when you are desperate to have it done – that’s the stuff mistakes are made of – costly mistakes that can land one on death-row or at the least a few decades in some high security jail with no guarantee you won’t leave in a six foot box. Guess what, the cops can’t be farther from the truth.
But don’t get me wrong, I go to church. I pay my tithe. I read the bible. I believe.
It’s against the law. What I do. I wouldn’t choose as a career if I had to make a conscious decision.
But sometimes life hands you a knife or a lemon or both and you don’t make lemonade without a few choice cuts, do you?
The commissions I take are bad people. Only their family would miss them. As it is said, no matter how ugly the monkey is, it’s loved by at least one person: it’s mother.

So I am doing my social duty. Ridding the society of evil: one scum at a time.
It’s not personal.
It’s business.
It’s just got a sharp edge.